pcm wrote:Letang's new contract won't kick in until Niskanen and Orpik (and Engelland) are all up for new ones. At that point, you look at guys like Despres, Harrington, Dumoulin to take those spots. Maybe Orpik signs a vet contract to finish out his career as a Pen, but he won't be making top 4 $.

Two questions... What is a 'vet contract', and why would a player take less money than he's worth in his prime earning years, which for Brooksy is the first contract after he wins a cup and gets selected for the US National team?

A vet contract is a contract signed for a player who's 35+ through the majority of its term. Brooks will be 34 when he starts his next contract. He could sign a 2 year deal for probably similar salary to what he's currently paid. Or he could sign a "vet deal", something like 5 years, where he gets paid $3.5 m the first two, then that drops down to $2m or thereabouts, averaging out to < 2.5 cap hit, and he retires a Penguin.

Subban shouldn't be a finalist. The guy is a complete power play specialist on a team that had 60 more minutes of power play time during the season than the Penguins. Seriously an entire game more of power play time. Subban isn't even a top 30 offensive producer among d-men in the league. I think Suter wins it and Subban finishes second, which is a complete joke. Subban had the same amount of even strength points as Niskanen, who was third on Pittsburgh (Martin had 14 in 8 less games than Subban) with 12. Letang lead the league by 5 in even strength points with 25 while playing 35 games. On top of that Montreal was 4th in the league in goals scored so it's not like Subban was playing on a team that struggles to score 5 on 5. He simply doesn't produce there.

pcm wrote:Letang's new contract won't kick in until Niskanen and Orpik (and Engelland) are all up for new ones. At that point, you look at guys like Despres, Harrington, Dumoulin to take those spots. Maybe Orpik signs a vet contract to finish out his career as a Pen, but he won't be making top 4 $.

Two questions... What is a 'vet contract', and why would a player take less money than he's worth in his prime earning years, which for Brooksy is the first contract after he wins a cup and gets selected for the US National team?

A vet contract is a contract signed for a player who's 35+ through the majority of its term. Brooks will be 34 when he starts his next contract. He could sign a 2 year deal for probably similar salary to what he's currently paid. Or he could sign a "vet deal", something like 5 years, where he gets paid $3.5 m the first two, then that drops down to $2m or thereabouts, averaging out to < 2.5 cap hit, and he retires a Penguin.

5-year deal seems sensible for a 34 year old whose best days are behind him

The obvious rebuttal is "he's good", but I can't help but wonder if he is part of this team's mentality problem. All it takes is 1 guy.

He reminds me of the kid in little league or whatever who thought he could do nothing wrong because of his skill, then threw a fit/ignored when someone tried to offer criticism of his game or called a foul/penalty on him because he thought he was too good to make mistakes.

If he is suspended or benched in this series we've already lost. I know he hasn't been great defensively but step back and imagine this team, which is already making us rip our hair out, without Letang and with Despres or Engelland again. Ugh.

I know he should be suspended but right now I care more about making it out of this round and hope he somehow gets out of it. But it is unacceptable.

MRandall25 wrote:The obvious rebuttal is "he's good", but I can't help but wonder if he is part of this team's mentality problem. All it takes is 1 guy.

He reminds me of the kid in little league or whatever who thought he could do nothing wrong because of his skill, then threw a fit/ignored when someone tried to offer criticism of his game or called a foul/penalty on him because he thought he was too good to make mistakes.

He would bring a helluva return in a trade. Not that I'm advocating one. Not sure how much more growth he has as a player. Even if the positive traits he had are exceptional.

For all the good Letang did in the regular season and in Game 1, he's been worse than Engo in Games 2, 3 and 4. Utter crap. Game 3, I think, was the worst. He passed it into the shins and sticks of at least, the very least, 10 Islander players -- many of these at his own blue line. He has to pick it up, big time.

PhantomJB93 wrote:If he is suspended or benched in this series we've already lost. I know he hasn't been great defensively but step back and imagine this team, which is already making us rip our hair out, without Letang and with Despres or Engelland again. Ugh.

I know he should be suspended but right now I care more about making it out of this round and hope he somehow gets out of it. But it is unacceptable.

Funny thing we did fine without him and Martin for a stretch against better teams.

pcm wrote:Letang's new contract won't kick in until Niskanen and Orpik (and Engelland) are all up for new ones. At that point, you look at guys like Despres, Harrington, Dumoulin to take those spots. Maybe Orpik signs a vet contract to finish out his career as a Pen, but he won't be making top 4 $.

Two questions... What is a 'vet contract', and why would a player take less money than he's worth in his prime earning years, which for Brooksy is the first contract after he wins a cup and gets selected for the US National team?

A vet contract is a contract signed for a player who's 35+ through the majority of its term. Brooks will be 34 when he starts his next contract. He could sign a 2 year deal for probably similar salary to what he's currently paid. Or he could sign a "vet deal", something like 5 years, where he gets paid $3.5 m the first two, then that drops down to $2m or thereabouts, averaging out to < 2.5 cap hit, and he retires a Penguin.

No mention of this in the CBA... If you mean the "Over 35" rule, I don't see how it would benefit us to sign him for longer since it just means he can retire and hit our cap for the duration of his deal.

What you're proposing here would violate the new variability rules of the new CBA. $1.5 million is ~42% of $3.5 million., and a player cannot make more than 35% less than what the Year 1 salary is.

PhantomJB93 wrote:If he is suspended or benched in this series we've already lost. I know he hasn't been great defensively but step back and imagine this team, which is already making us rip our hair out, without Letang and with Despres or Engelland again. Ugh.

I know he should be suspended but right now I care more about making it out of this round and hope he somehow gets out of it. But it is unacceptable.

Funny thing we did fine without him and Martin for a stretch against better teams.

I don't think we did, regardless of results. Our transition game was nonexistent and we had a hard time getting any offense going at all at even strength.

pcm wrote:Letang's new contract won't kick in until Niskanen and Orpik (and Engelland) are all up for new ones. At that point, you look at guys like Despres, Harrington, Dumoulin to take those spots. Maybe Orpik signs a vet contract to finish out his career as a Pen, but he won't be making top 4 $.

Two questions... What is a 'vet contract', and why would a player take less money than he's worth in his prime earning years, which for Brooksy is the first contract after he wins a cup and gets selected for the US National team?

By that same logic, why did Letang only sign an extension for $3.5 mil when he could've waited a year and made bank?

He was RFA... IIRC, he didn't get a blockbuster offer sheet from anyone. Can't remember his situation with arbitration, but I think he signed a deal that the market would bear.